10 Black Actors Who Portrayed White Characters

Hollywood is a cultural mix. Actors from all corners of the world are part of this multi-billion dollar business since the time the film industry got on its feet. Be it Africans, Hispanics, Asians, Indians; you name a race and they are all there! African-American actors particularly have had a dominant role to play in the growth of Hollywood’s showbiz and their numbers are only increasing. Special roles are written for actors of African descent in movies and needless to say, they have wowed generations of audiences all over the world.

But did y’all know that there are certain Black actors in the industry that were cast in roles written purely for white characters initially? And the Black actors played their roles so convincingly that it did not matter what race the character belonged to in the end. With that, we bring you a list of ten castings where Black actors portrayed roles originally meant for white characters.

10. Halle Berry as Catwoman

Listed among one of the worst films ever made, Pitof’s ‘Catwoman’ received as many as seven Razzie nominations, going on to win four out of those. Depicted as Batman’s love interest and the anti-heroine in comic books, the masked vigilante is a tall, fair-skinned blonde, who goes crime-fighting alongside the caped crusader. But for Pitof’s standalone film on the superheroine, which he had said was not really an adaptation of the comics; he roped in Black actress Halle Berry to star in it as the leading lady, which like the critics, did not go down well with commoners as well. Not only did Halle Berry’s ‘Catwoman’ become one of the greatest mistakes of her career, it almost packed it up for her too!

9. Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm

In Marvel comics’ Fantastic Four, Jonathan Lowell Spencer Storm aka Johnny Storm or the Human Torch is described as a muscular, young blonde with blue eyes, who possesses the superpower of pyro kinesis and the ability to manipulate fire. Interestingly, the young superhero wearing the blue outfits was portrayed by Chris Evans in the earlier Marvel movies, who now dons Captain America’s suit. But when the producers looked for a reboot of the franchise, young Black actor Michael B. Jordan was signed on board to play the role, who despite the film performing badly, did not let us down!

8. Idris Elba as Heimdall

As per Norse mythology, Heimdall is the watchman of the Gods, who is positioned at the gates of Asgard, and who is the all-hearing, all-seeing Asgardian custodian. With his keen senses and superpowers, he has ability to foresee events and is described as the shiniest god (for his gold-maned horse and gold teeth) with the whitest skins in the entire kingdom. But on the contrary, in Marvel’s Thor movies and Avenger series, Black actor Idris Elba features as the guardian of the Asgardian gates with a lot of action to his credit. And surprisingly, the actor put up such a great show that our knowledge of Norse mythology went out the window!

7. Laurence Fishburne as Perry White

When we talk of one name that goes with the word superhero, Superman immediately comes to mind. And when we think of everything related to the superhero comics and movies, we know for sure that all the characters in the film are Americans, including Perry White, the chief editor of Daily Planet and Clark Kent’s boss, who is an affable, tall, dark-haired, middle-aged man with blue eyes. Except for the 2013 movie ‘Man Of Steel’, starring Henry Cavill, White was portrayed by Black actor Laurence Fishburne. Although the seasoned actor did not have enough to do in the film, his portrayal finally broke our previous image of the fictional newspaper boss.

6. Will Smith as Dr. Robert Neville

Based on the sci-fi horror novel by Richard Matheson, the narrative follows the life of Dr. Robert Neville, the sole survivor of a vampire pandemic, who goes about understanding, researching and attempting to find a cure of the disease, to which he has become totally immune. Described as a Caucasian-American in the book, mostly of English-German descent, he is tall and has blue eyes; but in the movie adaptation of the novel, well-known Black actor Will Smith starred as the protagonist, who in a serious role impressed us all.

Add comment

Suggested For You

Detective television shows always manage to raise the innate investigator we all have within us. The reason why people find detective shows so engaging is because there’s enough space to explore a wide variety of themes and genres. While some...

When ‘The Blair Witch Project’ was released in 1999, it brought in a wave of change in the horror genre. The film tells the story of three student filmmakers — Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard — who...

Netflix has been one of the pioneering platforms for shows. From producing new content every month to using its production to rerun classic shows, the streaming giant is replete with quality shows, documentaries and movies. From chirpy themes to...

‘That Time I Got Reincarnated As a Slime’ is one of the best isekai anime to have come out in recent times. The anime aired its last episode of the first season this year in the month of March. It is really entertaining and fun with a...